by Timothy Zahn
“We will lower the planetary shields, Chimaera, as a gesture of good faith,” dosLla said at last, his tone defiant but with a hint of defeat to it. “But before the generators and ground/space weaponry can be turned over to Imperial forces we shall require certain guarantees regarding the safety of the Ukian people and our land.”
“Certainly,” Thrawn said, without any trace of the gloating that most Imperial commanders would have indulged in at this point. A small act of courtesy that, Pellaeon knew, was as precisely calculated as the rest of the attack had been. Permitting the Ukian leaders to surrender with their dignity intact would slow down the inevitable resistance to Imperial rule until it was too late. “A representative will be on his way shortly to discuss the particulars with your government,” Thrawn continued. “Meanwhile, I presume you have no objection to our forces taking up preliminary defense positions?”
A sigh, more felt than really heard. “We have no objections, Chimaera,” dosLla said reluctantly. “We are lowering the shield now.”
On the tactical display, the blue haze surrounding the planet faded away. “Master C’baoth, have the cruisers move to polar positions,” Thrawn ordered. “We don’t want any of the drop ships blundering into them. General Covell, you may begin transporting your forces to the surface. Standard defensive positions around all targets.”
“Acknowledged, Admiral,” Covell’s voice said, a little too dryly, and Pellaeon felt a tight smile twitch at his lip. It had only been two weeks since the top Fleet and army commanders had been let in on the secret of the Mount Tantiss cloning project, and Covell was one of those who still hadn’t adjusted completely to the idea.
Though the fact that three of the companies he was about to lead down to the surface were composed entirely of clones might have had something to do with his skepticism.
On the tactical hologram the first waves of drop ships and TIE fighter escorts had exited the Chimaera and Stormhawk, fanning out toward their assigned targets. Clones in drop ships, about to carry out Imperial orders. As the clone crews in the cloaked cruisers had already done so well.
Pellaeon frowned, an odd and uncomfortable thought suddenly striking him. Had C’baoth been able to guide the cruisers so well because each of their thousand-man crews were composed of variants on just twenty or so different minds? Or—even more disturbing—could part of the Jedi Master’s split-second control have been due to the fact that C’baoth was himself a clone?
And either way, did that mean that the Mount Tantiss project was playing directly into C’baoth’s hands in his bid for power? Perhaps. One more question he would have to bring to Thrawn’s attention.
Pellaeon looked down at C’baoth, belatedly remembering that in the Jedi Master’s presence such thoughts were not his private property. But C’baoth wasn’t looking at him, knowingly or otherwise. He was staring straight ahead, his eyes unfocused, the skin of his face taut. A faint smile just beginning to crease his lips. “Master C’baoth?”
“They’re there,” C’baoth whispered, his voice deep and husky. “They’re there,” he repeated, louder this time.
Pellaeon frowned back at the tactical hologram. “Who’s where?” he asked.
“They’re at Filve,” C’baoth said. Abruptly, he looked up at Pellaeon, his eyes bright and insane. “My Jedi are at Filve.”
“Master C’baoth, confirm that the cruisers have moved to polar positions,” Thrawn’s voice came sharply. “Then report on the feint battles—”
“My Jedi are at Filve,” C’baoth cut him off. “What do I care about your battles?”
“C’baoth—”
With a wave of his hand, C’baoth shut off the intercom. “Now, Leia Organa Solo,” he murmured softly, “you are mine.”
The Millennium Falcon twisted hard to starboard as a TIE fighter shot past overhead, lasers blazing away madly as it tried unsuccessfully to track the freighter’s maneuver. Clenching her teeth firmly against the movement, Leia Organa Solo watched as one of their escort X-wings blew the Imperial starfighter into a cloud of flaming dust. The sky spun around the Falcon’s canopy as the ship rolled back toward its original heading—
“Look out!” Threepio wailed from the seat behind Leia as another TIE fighter roared in toward them from the side. The warning was unnecessary; with deceptive ungainliness the Falcon was already corkscrewing back the other direction to bring its ventral quad laser battery to bear. Faintly audible even through the cockpit door, Leia heard the sound of a Wookiee battle roar, and the TIE fighter went the way of its late partner.
“Good shot, Chewie,” Han Solo called into the intercom as he got the Falcon leveled again. “Wedge?”
“Still with you, Falcon,” Wedge Antilles’ voice came promptly. “We’re clear for now, but there’s another wave of TIE fighters on the way.”
“Yeah.” Han glanced at Leia. “It’s your call, sweetheart. You still want to try and reach ground?”
Threepio gave a little electronic gasp. “Surely, Captain Solo, you aren’t suggesting—”
“Put a choke valve on it, Goldenrod,” Han cut him off. “Leia?”
Leia looked out the cockpit canopy at the Imperial Star Destroyer and eight Dreadnaughts arrayed against the beleaguered planet ahead. Clustering around it like mynocks around an unshielded power generator. It was to have been her last diplomatic mission before settling in to await the birth of her twins: a quick trip to calm a nervous Filvian government and demonstrate the New Republic’s determination to protect the systems in this sector.
Some demonstration.
“There’s no way we can make it through all that,” she told Han reluctantly. “Even if we could, I doubt the Filvians would risk opening the shield to let us in. We’d better make a run for it.”
“Sounds good to me,” Han grunted. “Wedge? We’re pulling out. Stay with us.”
“Copy, Falcon,” Wedge said. “You’ll have to give us a few minutes to calculate the jump back.”
“Don’t bother,” Han said, swiveling around in his seat to key in the nav computer. “We’ll feed you the numbers from here.”
“Copy. Rogue Squadron: screen formation.”
“You know, I’m starting to get tired of this,” Han told Leia, swiveling back to face front. “I thought you said your Noghri pals were going to leave you alone.”
“This has nothing to do with the Noghri.” Leia shook her head, an odd half-felt tension stretching at her forehead. Was it her imagination, or were the Imperial ships surrounding Filve starting to break formation? “This is Grand Admiral Thrawn playing with his new Dark Force Dreadnaughts.”
“Yeah,” Han agreed quietly, and Leia winced at the momentary flash of bitterness in his sense. Despite everyone’s best efforts to persuade him otherwise, Han still considered it his own personal fault that Thrawn had gotten to the derelict Katana fleet ships—the so-called Dark Force—ahead of the New Republic. “I wouldn’t have thought he could get them reconditioned this fast,” Han added as he twisted the Falcon’s nose away from Filve and back toward deep space.
Leia swallowed. The strange tension was still there, like a distant malevolence pressing against the edges of her mind. “Maybe he has enough Spaarti cylinders to clone some engineers and techs as well as soldiers.”
“That’s sure a fun thought,” Han said; and through her tension Leia could sense his sudden change in mood as he tapped the comm switch. “Wedge, take a look back at Filve and tell me if I’m seeing things.”
Over the comm, Leia could hear Wedge’s thoughtful intake of air. “You mean like the whole Imperial force breaking off their attack and coming after us?”
“Yeah. That.”
“Looks real enough to me,” Wedge said. “Could be a good time to get out of here.”
“Yeah,” Hah said slowly. “Maybe.”
Leia frowned at her husband. There’d been something in his voice.… “Han?”
“The Filvians would’ve called for help before they put up their shield, ri
ght?” Han asked her, forehead furrowed with thought.
“Right,” Leia agreed cautiously.
“And the nearest New Republic base is Ord Pardron, right?”
“Right.”
“Okay. Rogue Squadron, we’re changing course to starboard. Stay with me.”
He keyed his board, and the Falcon started a sharp curve to the right. “Watch it, Falcon—this is taking us back toward that TIE fighter group,” Wedge warned.
“We’re not going that far,” Han assured him. “Here’s our vector.”
He straightened out the ship onto their new course heading and threw a look at the rear display. “Good—they’re still chasing us.”
Behind him, the nav computer beeped its notification that the jump coordinates were ready. “Wedge, we’ve got your coordinates,” Leia said, reaching for the data transmission key.
“Hold it, Falcon,” Wedge cut her off. “We’ve got company to starboard.”
Leia looked that direction, her throat tightening as she saw what Wedge meant. The approaching TIE fighters were coming up fast, and already were close enough to eavesdrop on any transmission the Falcon tried to make to its escort. Sending Wedge the jump coordinates now would be an open invitation for the Imperials to have a reception committee waiting at the other end.
“Perhaps I can be of assistance, Your Highness,’ Threepio offered brightly. “As you know, I am fluent in over six million forms of communication. I could transmit the coordinates to Commander Antilles in Boordist or Vaathkree trade language, for example—”
“And then you’d send them the translation?” Han put in dryly.
“Of course—” The droid broke off. “Oh, dear,” he said, sounding embarrassed.
“Yeah, well, don’t worry about it,” Han said. “Wedge, you were at Xyquine two years ago, weren’t you?”
“Yes. Ah. A Cracken Twist?”
“Right. On two: one, two.”
Outside the canopy, Leia caught a glimpse of the X-wings swinging into a complicated new escort formation around the Falcon. “What does this buy us?” she asked.
“Our way out,” Han told her, checking the rear display again. “Pull the coordinates, add a two to the second number of each one, and then send the whole package to the X-wings.”
“I see,” Leia nodded her understanding as she got to work. Altering the second digit wouldn’t change the appearance of their exit vector enough for the Imperials to catch on to the trick, but it would be more than enough to put any chase force a couple of light-years off target. “Clever. And that little flight maneuver they did just now was just window dressing?”
“Right. Makes anyone watching think that’s all there is to it. A little something Pash Cracken came up with at that fiasco off Xyquine.” Han glanced at the rear display again. “I think we’ve got enough lead to outrun them,” he said. “Let’s try.”
“We’re not jumping to lightspeed?” Leia frowned, an old and rather painful memory floating up from the back of her mind. That mad scramble away from Hoth, with Darth Vader’s whole fleet breathing down their necks and a hyperdrive that turned out to be broken …
Han threw her a sideways look. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. The hyperdrive’s working fine today.”
“Let’s hope so,” Leia murmured.
“See, as long as they’re chasing us they can’t bother Filve,” Han went on. “And the farther we draw them away, the longer the backup force’ll have to get here from Ord Pardron.”
The brilliant green flash of a near miss cut off Leia’s intended response. “I think we’ve given them all the time we can,” she told Han. Within her, she could sense the turmoil coming from her unborn twins. “Can we please get out of here?”
A second bolt spattered off the Falcon’s upper deflector shield. “Yeah, I think you’re right,” Han agreed. “Wedge? You ready to leave this party?”
“Whenever you are, Falcon,” Wedge said. “Go ahead—we’ll follow when you’re clear.”
“Right.” Reaching over, Han gripped the hyperdrive levers and pulled them gently back. Through the cockpit canopy the stars stretched themselves into starlines, and they were safe.
Leia took a deep breath, let it out slowly. Within her, she could still sense the twins’ anxiety, and for a moment she turned her mind to the job of calming them down. It was a strange sensation, she’d often thought, touching minds that dealt in emotion and pure sensation instead of pictures and words. So different from the minds of Han and Luke and her other friends.
So different, too, from the distant mind that had been orchestrating that Imperial attack force.
Behind her, the door slid open and Chewbacca came into the cockpit. “Good shooting, Chewie,” Han told the Wookiee as he heaved his massive bulk into the portside passenger seat beside Threepio. “You have any more trouble with the horizontal control arm?”
Chewbacca rumbled a negative. His dark eyes studying Leia’s face, he growled her a question. “I’m all right,” Leia assured him, blinking back sudden and inexplicable tears. “Really.”
She looked at Han, to find him frowning at her, too. “You weren’t worried, were you?” he asked. “It was just an Imperial task force. Nothing to get excited about.”
She shook her head. “It wasn’t that, Han. There was something else back there. A kind of …” She shook her head again. “I don’t know.”
“Perhaps it was similar to your indisposition at Endor,” Threepio offered helpfully. “You remember—when you collapsed while Chewbacca and I were repairing the—?”
Chewbacca rumbled a warning, and the droid abruptly shut up. But far too late. “No—let him talk,” Han said, his sense going all protectively suspicious as he looked at Leia. “What indisposition was this?”
“There wasn’t anything to it, Han,” Leia assured him, reaching over to take his hand. “On our first orbit around Endor we passed through the spot where the Death Star blew up. For a few seconds I could feel something like the Emperor’s presence around me. That’s all.”
“Oh, that’s all,” Han said sarcastically, throwing a brief glare back at Chewbacca. “A dead Emperor tries to make a grab for you, and you don’t think it’s worth mentioning?”
“Now you’re being silly,” Leia chided. “There was nothing to worry about—it was over quickly, and there weren’t any aftereffects. Really. Anyway, what I felt back at Filve was completely different.”
“Glad to hear it,” Han said, not yet ready to let it go. “Did you have any of the med people check you over or anything after you got back?”
“Well, there really wasn’t any time before—”
“Fine. You do it as soon as we’re back.”
Leia nodded with a quiet sigh. She knew that tone; and it wasn’t something she could wholeheartedly argue against, anyway. “All right. If I can find time.”
“You’ll make time,” Han countered. “Or I’ll have Luke lock you in the med center when he gets back. I mean it, sweetheart.”
Leia squeezed his hand, feeling a similar squeeze on her heart as she did so. Luke, off alone in Imperial territory … but he was all right. He had to be. “All right,” she told Han. “I’ll get checked out. I promise.”
“Good,” he said, his eyes searching her face. “So what was it you felt back at Filve?”
“I don’t know.” She hesitated. “Maybe it was the same thing Luke felt on the Katana. You know—when the Imperials put that landing party of clones aboard.”
“Yeah,” Han agreed doubtfully. “Maybe. Those Dreadnaughts were awfully far away.”
“There were probably a lot more clones, though, too.”
“Yeah. Maybe,” Han said again. “Well … I suppose Chewie and me’d better get to work on that ion flux stabilizer before it quits on us completely Can you handle things up here okay, sweetheart?”
“I’m fine,” Leia assured him, just as glad to be leaving this line of conversation. “You two go ahead.”
Because the other possibili
ty was one she’d just as soon not think about right now. The Emperor, it had long been rumored, had had the ability to use the Force to exercise direct control over his military forces. If the Jedi Master Luke had confronted on Jomark had that same ability …
Reaching down, she caressed her belly and focused on the pair of tiny minds within her. No, it was indeed not something she wanted to think about.
“I presume,” Thrawn said in that deadly calm voice of his, “that you have some sort of explanation.”
Slowly, deliberately, C’baoth lifted his head from the command room’s double display circle to look at the Grand Admiral. At the Grand Admiral and, with undisguised contempt, at the ysalamir on its nutrient frame slung across Thrawn’s shoulders. “Do you likewise have an explanation, Grand Admiral Thrawn?” he demanded.
“You broke off the diversionary attack on Filve,” Thrawn said, ignoring C’baoth’s question. “You then proceeded to send the entire task force on a dead-end chase.”
“And you, Grand Admiral Thrawn, have failed to bring my Jedi to me,” C’baoth countered. His voice, Pellaeon noticed uneasily, was slowly rising in both pitch and volume. “You, your tame Noghri, your entire Empire—all of you have failed.”
Thrawn’s glowing red eyes narrowed. “Indeed? And was it also our failure that you were unable to hold on to Luke Skywalker after we delivered him to you on Jomark?”
“You did not deliver him to me, Grand Admiral Thrawn,” C’baoth insisted. “I summoned him there through the Force—”
“It was Imperial Intelligence who planted the rumor that Jorus C’baoth had returned and been seen on Jomark,” Thrawn cut him off coldly. “It was Imperial Transport who brought you there, Imperial Supply who arranged and provisioned that house for you, and Imperial Engineering who built the camouflaged island landing site for your use. The Empire did its part to get Skywalker into your hands. It was you who failed to keep him there.”
“No!” C’baoth snapped. “Skywalker left Jomark because Mara Jade escaped from you and twisted his mind against me. And she will pay for that. You hear me? She shall pay.”
